Having spent the '80's making some of the most compelling rock n roll ever to come out of the city of Los Angeles and breaking up for good in the later part of that decade, this final studio album by X which came two years after a surprise "reunion" by the band in late 1990 would serve not as a grand swan song for this tried and true group that built a reputation on making wild and diverse punk rock, but more of a small token gesture and sign post of where the individual members were artistically, creatively, and personally at this point in their respective careers.
Produced by Tony Berg (a well known studio musician and producer /arranger who had worked with everyone from Debbie Boone to Edie Brickell to Squeeze and Air Supply) this album would find the band not quite a band at all and more like four solo artist coming together to make a record under the old band name. And Bergs big, heavy sounding production does nothing to try and rectify that.
From the outset you would be hard pressed to identify this as an X record. The album opener "Someones Watching" get's things off to a generic start with a forced mid tempo sludge fest that you can only hope will loosen up as the album progresses. All bombastic power chords and weird shifting melody, it neither makes an impression as an album opener or gives the listener anything to object to. It's music, lyrics, and performance unremarkable in every way. Fairing better on the next few cuts "Big Blue House" is a pleasant and bouncy tune that finds vocalists/songwriters John and Exene harmonizing together like it was the early '80's rather then the '90's, and it moves along with the aid of a good melody and strong pop hook. And the next track on the album, "Clean Like Tommorow", is the first of too few songs here to kick out the jams the way this band used to back in it's heyday. "The days of disgrace / And unwashed sorrow / I need a love clean like tomorrow" Doe and Cervenka croon in unison. And if you close your eyes and try hard enough, you can almost believe them. Wrapping the first half of things up with the decent socially conscious and rootsy rocker "Country At War" and the overwrought and cheesy Cervenka penned bore fest "Arms For Hostages", and what we have here is an X album in name only, as the sound, heart, and soul of this band is clearly a much changed and different beast then before.
Perhaps the main reason for this is where this album came from. Whereas before Doe and Cervenka were very much a writing team and functioned as a unit, here the songs come from individuals rather then a pair. The first X album ever to have individual writing credits rather then "songs by Doe/Cervenka, music by X" credits, indeed only two songs here are credited to the once vibrant songwriting duo, and even guitarist Tony Gilkyson gets in on the action. And it shows in the sound and sprit of this recording. No longer a little punk rock family or a full time rock n roll band, the intimacy that was present on past X records is simply in short and rare supply.
Kicking off the second half of the album with the John Doe penned "Into The Light" and things stay pretty much the same. Obviously a song intended for his solo work with very un X like lyrics and themes, it nonetheless shows good songwriting skills and thoughtful lyrics go a long way no matter what kind of music you're playing, or who it does or does not sound like. Coming up next we are treated to just the second song on the album credited to Doe/Cervenka in the lyrically oblique and musically forceful "Lettuce And Vodka" and we are given a little hope that this record will wrap up with a bit of a bang rather then the middle of the road kind of fare that had come before it. Staying true to it's pattern though, the next three songs neither disappoint or inspire one way or another. The Cervenka written pop of "Everybody" is pleasant enough, and followed by the Doe penned punk-a-billy of "Baby You Lied" with it's clever lyrics of a cheating lover and strong melody, the album does in fact come together nicely as a solid piece of work and album. Just not an X album. And as if to leave no doubt of that fact, closing the album is the Cervenka written "Drawn In The Darkness". Which is about as far from X as you can imagine with it's vague and fiddling production and musically thin style. It indeed would have been right at home on one of Cervenka's recent at the time solo albums.
Not a bad album by any stretch of the imagination, yet not a fully realized X album either, Hey Zeus would find this group of aging punk musicians coming together one last time to make music just for the sake of making music. Not content to repeat themselves or to take advantage of the "new music" explosion that bands such as Nirvana and Green Day were leading at the time but had come far too late for bands like X, this group of near middle aged punk rock mothers and fathers would simply come together with their own music and songs, throw it into a big mixing pot, and season it with a little essence of X. Not a bad meal if you're in the mood for something different from the X menu. But Hey Zeus is nonetheless acquired tasting and perhaps best left to those who can enjoy it with memories of better X cuisine gone past. As it is it's a bit chewy, a little overcooked, and just a tad shy of any real flavor. And it sure could use some of that wild 'ol X moonshine to help wash it all down.
